Fool's Fate (12 page)

    “I shall. But won't folk wonder where I got it?”

    “I doubt it. We'll have Chade put out some tale that he has been holding it for you. Folk love stories of that sort. They'll be happy to accept it.”

    He nodded thoughtfully, then said slowly, “It takes some of the pleasure from it, that you cannot carry Chivalry's sword as openly as I shall carry this one.”

    “For me also,” I replied with painful honesty. “Would that I could, Dutiful. But that is simply how it is. I've a sword given to me by Lord Golden, also of a quality that exceeds my skill. I'll carry that. If I ever lift a blade to defend you, it had better be an axe.”

    He looked down, pondering. Then he set his hand to the hilt of Chivalry's sword. “Until the day when you give this sword back to me, on the day I am crowned, I wish it to remain here with you.” He took a breath. “And when I take your father's sword from you, I will return my father's sword to you.”

    That was a gesture I could not refuse.

    Soon he left as he had come, taking Verity's sword with him. I made myself a fresh cup of tea and sat considering my father's blade. I tried to think what it meant to me, but encountered only a curious absence inside myself. Even my recent discovery that he had not ignored me, but had Skill-watched me through his brother's eyes, did not make up for his physical absence in my life. Perhaps he had loved me from afar, but Burrich had been the one to discipline me and Chade the one to teach me. I looked at the blade and groped for a sense of connection, for any emotion at all, but could not find one. By the time I had finished my tea, I still had no answer, nor was I completely certain what my question was. But I had resolved that I would find time to see Hap again before I departed.

    I went to bed, successfully claiming the pillow from Gilly. Nonetheless, I slept badly, and even that poor rest was interrupted. Nettle edged into my dreams like a child reluctantly seeking comfort. It was a peculiar contrast. In my dream, I was crossing a steep scree slope from my sojourn in the mountains. I had crossed this avalanche-prone incline carrying the Fool's lax body. I was not so burdened in my dream, but the mountainside seemed steeper and the fall eternal. Loose pebbles shifted treacherously under my feet. At any moment I might go sliding off the face of the mountain like the small stones rattling past me. My muscles ached with tension and sweat streamed down my back. Then I caught a flash of motion at the corner of my eye. I turned my head slowly, for I dared risk no swift movement. I discovered Nettle sitting calmly uphill from me, watching my agonized progress.

    She sat amongst grass and wildflowers. Her gown was green and her hair decked with tiny daisies. Even to my father's eyes, she looked more woman than child, but she sat like a little girl, her knees drawn up under her chin and her arms clasped around her legs. Her feet were bare and her eyes troubled.

    Such was our dichotomy. I still struggled to retain my footing on the unstable slope. In her dream, adjoining mine, she sat in a mountain meadow. Her presence forced me to admit that I dreamed, and yet I could not surrender the exertion of my nightmare. I did not know if I feared I would be swept to my death or thrust into wakefulness. So, “What is it?” I called to her as I continued my inching progress across the mountain's face. It mattered not how many steps I took: solid ground remained ever distant, while Nettle kept her place above me.

    “My secret,” she said quietly. “It gnaws at me. So I have come to ask your advice.”

    She paused but I did not reply. I did not want to know her secret, or to offer advice. I could not commit myself to helping her. Despite the dream, I knew I was leaving Buckkeep soon. Even if I stayed, I could not venture into her life without the risk of destroying it. Better to remain a vague dream-thing on the edge of her reality. Despite my silence, she spoke to me.

    “If someone gives her word to keep silent about a thing, not realizing how much pain it will bring, not just to herself but to others, is she bound to keep her word?”

    That was too grave a question to leave unanswered. “You know the answer to that,” I panted. “A woman's word is her word. She keeps it, or it is worth nothing.”

    “But I did not know the trouble it would cause when I gave it. Nim goes about like half a creature. I did not know that Mama would blame Papa, or that Papa would take to drink over it, blaming himself more deeply than she does.”

    I halted. It was dangerous to do so, but I turned to face her. Her words had plummeted me into a deeper danger than the chasm that yawned below me. I spoke carefully. “And you think you've found a way around the word you gave. To tell me what you promised not to tell them.”

    She lowered her forehead to her knees. Her voice was muffled when she spoke. “You said you knew Papa, long ago. I do not know who you truly are; but perhaps you know him still. You could speak to him. The last time Swift ran away, you told me when he and Papa were safely on their way home to us. Oh, please, Shadow Wolf! I don't know what your connection to my family is, but I know it exists. In trying to aid Swift, I have nearly torn us apart. I have no one else to turn to. And I never promised Swift that I would not tell you.”

    I looked down at my feet. She had changed me into her image of me. Her dream was devouring mine. Now I was a man-wolf. My black claws dug into the loose gravel. Moving on all fours, with my weight lower, I clawed my way up the slope toward her. When I was close enough to see the dried salt track of tears on her cheeks, I growled, “Tell me what?”

    It was all the permission she needed. “They think Swift ran away to sea, for so we made it seem, he and I. Oh, do not look at me like that! You don't know what it was like around here! Papa was a perpetual storm cloud and Swift near as bad. Poor Nim slunk around like a whipped dog, ashamed to win praise from Papa because his twin could not share it. And Mama, Mama was like a madwoman, every night demanding to know what ailed them, and both of them refusing to answer. There was no peace in our house anymore, no peace at all. So when Swift came to me and asked me to help him slip away, it seemed the wise thing to do.”

    “And what sort of aid did you give him?”

    “I gave him money, money that was mine, to use as I pleased, money I had earned myself helping with the Gossoin's lambing last spring. Mama often sent him to town, to make deliveries of honey or candles. I thought up the plan for him, that he would start asking neighbors and folk in town about boats and fishing and the sea. And then, at the last, I wrote a letter and signed Papa's name as I have become accustomed to doing for him. His eyes...Papa can still write, but his hand wanders for he cannot see the letters he is forming. So, of late, I have written things for him, the papers when he sells a horse and such. Everyone says that my hand is just like his; probably because he taught me to make my letters. So...”

    “So you wrote a letter for Swift saying that his father had released him and that he could go forth and do as he pleased with his life.” I spoke slowly. Every word she spoke burdened me more. Burrich and Molly quarreled, and he took to drink again. His sight was failing him, and he believed he had driven his son away. Hearing these things rent me, for I knew I could not mend any of them.

    “It can be difficult for a boy to find any sort of work if folk think he is a runaway apprentice or a lad whose work still belongs to his father.” She spoke the words hesitantly, trying to excuse her forgery. I dared not look at her. “Mama packed up six racks of candles and sent Swift into town to deliver them and to bring back the money. When he said good-bye to me, I knew he meant to take that opportunity. He never came back.” Around her, flowers bloomed and a tiny bee buzzed from one to the next, seeking nectar.

    I slowly worked through her words. “He stole the candle money to travel on?” My estimate of Swift dropped.

    “It wasn't...it wasn't exactly stealing. He'd always helped with the hives. And he needed it!”

    I shook my head slowly. It disappointed me that she found excuses for him. But then, I'd never had a little brother. Perhaps it was a thing all sisters did.

    “Won't you help me?” she asked piteously when my silence grew long.

    “I can't,” I said helplessly. “I can't.”

    “Why not?”

    “How could I?” I was completely in her dream now. The meadow grass was firm beneath my feet. A spring day in the hills surrounded me. The bee buzzed past my ear, and I flicked it away. I knew my nightmare still lurked behind me. If I stepped back two paces, I'd be on that treacherous slope again.

    “Talk to Papa for me. Tell him it wasn't his fault Swift went away.”

    “I can't talk to your papa. I'm far, far away. Only in dreams can we reach across distances like this.”

    “Can't you visit his dreams, as you do mine? Can't you talk to him there?”

    “No. I can't.” Long ago, my father had sealed Burrich off from all other Skill-users. Burrich himself had told me that. Chivalry had been able to draw strength from him for Skilling, and the bond between them meant that Chivalry would be vulnerable through Burrich to other Skill-users. Dimly I wondered, did that mean that at one time Burrich had had some level of Skill ability? Or did it only mean that the two men were so close that Chivalry could take strength from him for Skilling?

    “Why not? You come to my dreams. And you were friends long ago; you said so. Please. He can't go on as he is. It's killing him. And my mother.” She added softly, “I think you owe him this.”

    A bee from Nettle's flowers buzzed past my face and I swiped at it. I decided I needed to end this contact swiftly. She was drawing too many conclusions about her father and me. “I cannot come to your father's dreams, Nettle. But there may be something I can do. I may be able to speak to someone, someone who can find Swift and send him home again.” Even as I said the words, my heart sank. As annoying as Swift was, I knew what it would mean to the boy to be sent back to Burrich; I hardened my will. It truly wasn't my problem. Swift was Burrich's son, and they must sort it out themselves.

    “Then you know where Swift is? You've seen him? Is he well, is he safe? A thousand times I've thought of him, so young and alone and out in the world. I never should have let him talk me into this! Tell me about him.”

    “He's fine,” I said shortly. The bee buzzed past my ear again. I felt it settle on the back of my neck. I tried to paw it off me, but an instant later, I was bowed under the weight of a sizable animal on my back. I yelped and struggled, but before I could draw breath, I was dangling from the dragon's jaws. She gave me a shake, not to kill but to caution. I stopped struggling and hung there. Her teeth gripped the scruff of my neck, not piercing either hide or flesh but paralyzing me.

    As Nettle surged indignantly to her feet, reaching for me, the dragon lifted me higher. I dangled above Nettle and then was swung out over the chasm from my earlier nightmare.

    “Ah-ah!” the dragon cautioned us both. “Resist and I drop him. Wolves do not fly.” Her words did not come from her mouth and throat, but penetrated my thoughts, a mind-to-mind touch.

    Nettle froze. “What do you want?” she growled. Her dark eyes had gone flinty.

    “He knows,” Tintaglia replied, giving me a small shake. I felt it unhinge every bone in my spine. “I want to know all that you know of a black dragon buried in ice. I want to know all you know of an island humans name Aslevjal.”

    “I know nothing of such things!” Nettle replied angrily. Her hands had knotted into fists. “Let him go.”

    “Very well.” The dragon released me, and for a heart-stopping instant, I plummeted. Then her head shot out on her snakelike neck and she caught me up again. This time her jaws encompassed my ribs. She squeezed me, demonstrating how easily she could crush me. Then she eased the pressure and asked me, “And what do you know, little wolf thing?”

    “Nothing!” I gasped, and then choked out every bit of air in my lungs as she crushed me. It would be quick, I told myself. I would not have to maintain my lie long. She wasn't a patient creature; she'd kill me swiftly. I glanced back to take a last look at my daughter.

    Nettle stood, suddenly larger than she had been. Then she flung her arms wide. Her hair tossed in a wind that only she felt, and then haloed out around her face. She threw her head back. “This is a dream!” she shouted. “And it is my dream! I cast you out of it!” The last she spoke as single words, uttered with all the command of a queen. For the first time, I comprehended the strength of my daughter's Skill. Her ability to shape dreams and command that which happened in them was a manifestation of her Skill-talent.

    Tintaglia flung me spinning out over an infinite void. Beneath me I saw, not the rocky chasm of my dream, but a vast emptiness without color or end. I had one whirling glimpse of the dragon writhing as Nettle dwindled her back to the size of a bee. Then I clenched my eyes shut against the dizzying fall. Even as I drew painful breath to scream, Nettle spoke softly by my ear. “It's only a dream, Shadow Wolf. And it belongs to me. In my dreams, you will never come to harm. Open your eyes, now. Awake to your own world.”

    An instant before I awoke, I felt the comforting resistance of bedding beneath me and when I opened my eyes to the darkness of my workroom, I was not in panic. Nettle had taken the terror from the nightmare. For a moment, I felt relief. I drew a deep breath, and as I surrendered to sleep once more, I felt a drowsy amazement at my daughter's odd Skill-strength. But as I tugged my blanket back over my shoulder and reclaimed half the pillow from the ferret, the earlier portion of my dream dragged me back to wakefulness. Swift had lied. Burrich hadn't discarded him. Worse, his leaving had thrown the family into turmoil.

    I lay still, eyes closed, wishing vainly to sleep. Instead, I mapped out what I must do. The boy must be sent home, but I didn't want to be the one to do it. He'd demand to know how I knew he had lied. So. I'd tell Chade that Burrich had not released Swift from his household. That would involve admitting to Chade that I'd had more Skill-contact with Nettle. Well, it couldn't be helped, I told myself grumpily. All my secrets seemed intent on leaking out and becoming known.